Federal Prisons

This issue is going to production on the heels of the first countrywide action engaged in by a yet-unknown number of members of the United Front for Peace in Prisons (UFPP), representing many political, religious and lumpen organizations and hailing from the prison systems of Nevada, North Carolina, Florida, New York, California, Texas, Missouri, Pennsylvania and the Federal system. Initially called for by UFPP signatory SAMAEL, MIM(Prisons) promoted the call for the Day of Solidarity on September 9 in our last issue of Under Lock & Key as something we felt embodied what the united front is about. In this issue we summarize what we know so far, but we expect to learn more in the coming weeks and will continue to report on this important action.

For our part, MIM(Prisons) made a strong effort back in July to directly contact all other prison rights organizations and activists on the outside to let them know about the Day of Solidarity. We also promoted it generally online and handed out fliers with the five principles of the UFPP on them at many events related to prisons and peace on the streets. Other media outlets that promoted the call included the San Francisco BayView Newspaper, anti-imperialism.com and NorthBay Uprising Radio (89.5 KZCT in Vallejo, CA), which did an extensive interview with a comrade about the day of solidarity, the united front and the prison struggle in general. Other articles in this issue discuss some of the repression faced by prisoners and MIM(Prisons) leading up to the action.

All that said, the primary focus of the day was the organizing of prisoners. To facilitate this we distributed updates to everyone involved about the plans of other groups participating, similar to what we did during the California strikes. One story we distributed from New York was from a handwritten kite a comrade passed to another brother at his facility: “Bro. - Please pay close attention to the article ‘Call for Solidarity Demonstration September 9’ on page 3. Let me know what you think. I’ve decided to fast on Sept 9th.” The response was written on the same paper: “Yes I will fast on that day, it looks better when we all go to chow but we just don’t eat. Thanks for that information.” (This was what the 800 Attica comrades did on that day in 1971 in honor of George Jackson’s murder.) The original organizers got this report and adjusted their own plans to go to chow and dispose of meals as outlined in their cheat sheet (see <a href=““Solidarity”>“Solidarity and Peace Demonstration Builds, Guards Retaliate”). This cheat sheet was passed on to the comrades in Florida whose report appears below, who also adopted the tactic:

On 9 September 2012, at Everglades Correctional Institution in Florida, individual members of The Blood Nation honored the soldiers of Attica by doing one or more of the following: fasting, boycotting the canteen/commissary, accepting chow hall trays and dumping them, and explaining why. Also participating individually were one or more members of the following groups (in alphabetical order): Black Gangsta Disciples, Crip Nation, Insane Gangsta Disciples, Almighty Latin King Queen Nation, Nation of Islam, Spanish Cobras, Shi’a Muslim Community, and Sufi Community. My apologies to anyone I missed. It was a small step at a spot with no history of unity, but even a single drop of water in a dry glass makes it wet. Respect to those who made the sacrifice, those who joined us midday, and those who expressed interest the day after. I’m as human as anyone, but let’s TRY to remember who the enemy is!

Good work comrades! Seems like organizations in Florida are open to solidarity as another comrade from that state reports: “Being that today is September 9 and a day of solidarity and peace, all sorts of nations (organizations) got together here in the rec yard and had a jailhouse BBQ and lived in peace just for the day here at Cross City, Florida.”

Many of our supporters are suffering in long-term isolation, so the opportunity for mass organizing is greatly limited. A report from Missouri read:

Today is September 9, 2012. My comrade (my celly) and I are participating in the mass stoppage of work and fast for our comrades who fell in Attica. Although we are in Ad-Seg we have chosen to sacrifice: no food, no [petty stuff], no arguing out the door, only working out four times for one hour each time, reading, studying and talking politics. For me fasting is something I do once a month, but today is the first time I’ve worked out during my fast. My comrade is pushing me and I’m not stopping. From midnight to midnight is how we’re moving.

This white comrade also reported that he received ULK 27 announcing the Day of Solidarity, while his Black comrade’s was censored. They report this is a common form of discrimination in Missouri.

Another great success occurred in Nevada where SAMAEL led the organizing of a good cross-section of prisoners representing about 30% of the population. Even if we get no other reports on the September 9 action, we’d say it was a success just from these examples. But we know from the list of states above that the day had much broader participation.

The progress represented by prisoners across the country acting in solidarity as a class took place in the context of the many other strikes and mass actions prisoners have led in the past year or more that have built off of each other as cipactli writes about in “Prisoner Uprisings Foretell Growing Movement”. This progress is exciting on the subjective level. And we can look at periods of mass uprising to see what happens when times are “exciting.” They tend to be crazy as well. People are confused, trying to figure things out and the enemy is working hard to confuse them more and divide them. So it is of the utmost importance that as the new prison movement emerges that we take time to study questions of security and correct leadership.

There is the question of security at the individual level, and how we judge someone by putting politics in command, as discussed by PTT in relation to Richard Aoki. In the belly of the beast, where there is so much wealth and privilege, security at the group level is very tied up with our class analysis. As our Nevada comrade points out in “Fighting Enemies in the Prison Movement”, most people in this country will actively support imperialism without directly getting a paycheck for it, and this is true for a portion of the prison population as well.

One thing that sets communists apart from other revolutionary trends is our stress on the importance of correct ideological leadership. Putting politics in command can guide us in dealing with all challenges we face, not just security. We recognize that the truth will come from mass struggle, but that it will not always be recognized by the masses when they see it because everyone needs to learn to think in a scientific way first. In order to pick the best leadership, we must all be well-studied to think scientifically about both history and our current conditions. As we point out to the comrade who suspects we might be CIA, you should be able to judge the correctness of ULK and to struggle with us where you think we are wrong to decide whether the risk of subscribing is worth it.

Our comrade in BORO puts the September 9 Day of Solidarity in this context well when s/he writes: “Through the lens of a dialectical-materialist, we must see history as a never-ending stream of past events that gave and constantly give birth to present realities. This chain of historical events is constantly moving us forward into the ocean of endless possibilities. We must use this view of a ‘living history’ as a source of defining who we are and the direction we’re heading as a people.” (See “Black August and Bloody September: Stand Up and Remember on September 9.”)

This September protest wasn’t just to spend a day sitting quietly honoring the past; it was a time to learn from the past and apply lessons to address our current conditions. The day was a success, but it was only one step in developing a class-conscious prison movement that can change conditions. In the coming weeks, we look forward to hearing of more successes and accomplishments that organizers achieved on September 9.

We hope that some of the articles in this issue can push forward among the masses the question of recognizing correct leadership to avoid the traps of the state and its sympathizers. For those who want to learn, MIM(Prisons)’s Serve the People Free Political Literature to Prisoners Program and correspondence study groups operate year round, not just in August.

North Carolina’s so-called Department of Public Safety has joined a number of state agencies in openly sabotaging efforts to prevent prisoners from fighting in their facilities.

MIM(Prisons) and our readers in North Carolina have received multiple notices of censorship of Under Lock & Key 27, most of them citing page 3, which contained the Call for Solidarity Demonstration on September 9. In their doublespeak, they justify this with reasons such as that it promotes “violence, disorder, insurrection or terrorist/gang activities” and that it “encourages insurrection and disorder.” This was in reference to a call for 24 hours with no eating, working or fighting, where prisoners only engaged in solidarity actions and networking to build peace.

Many other states censored Under Lock & Key 27 for threatening the security of the institution (including New York, California, Wisconsin, and Illinois). Wisconsin Department of Corrections later claimed that ULK 27 “teaches or advocates violence and presents a clear and present danger to institutional security.” So there you have it. Prisoners coming together, for whatever cause, is a security threat to them. Making it clear what they are trying to secure, which is the prevention of the self-determination of the oppressed nation lumpen. This has nothing to do with the persynal safety of humyn beings, which the Call for September 9 was clear in promoting.

Folsom State Prison in California went so far as to say that ULK 27 was censored for “advocating civil disobedience in prisons.” Even this claim is a stretch, unless fasting and not working for a day, a Sunday no less, is disobeying the law in some way. Texas seems to think so, as they censored many copies of ULK 27 with the consistent reason that it “advocates hunger strike and work stoppage.” Well we know Texas is big on unpaid labor in their prisons. And we suppose it’s not breaking news that peaceful civil disobedience is a crime in the eyes of the state of California.

Despite the more honest justifications given by some state employees in California and Texas, safety and security concerns remain the number one reason given by states to censor MIM(Prisons)’s mail to prisoners. To call these agencies on their bluff, MIM(Prisons) proposes that organizations within the United Front for Peace who are working to build off of September 9 focus on promoting safety in their agitational and organizational work. From the countless painful letters we get from U.$. prisoners who fear for their life everyday in these places, we are pretty sure that working together we can do a better job of creating a safe environment than they can.

Comrades should brainstorm ideas of how to launch a campaign to change the conditions that the state creates that lead to unsafe conditions for prisoners. Often unsafe conditions for prisoners are potentially unsafe for staff as well. Either way, an effective campaign to make prisoners safer should bring around new recruits.

Can we get enough stories of comrades working to help each other out and improve each other’s well-being to make ULK 29 an issue focused on creating safer prisons in the U.$? And you artists out there, any ideas on how to promote issues of safety and security that speak to the prison masses?

Let’s see what we can do with this. And look out for each other in there.

The first protest that got the world’s attention was in Libya, where U.$.-backed forces recently overthrew the decades-old government there. Timed to occur on the anniversary of the 11 September 2001 attacks on the United $tates by Al Qaeda, rebels grabbed headlines by laying siege to the embassy, killing as many as a dozen people, including the new U.$. ambassador. Since then protestors have attacked imperialist embassies in Tunisia, Yemen and Sudan without firearms.

While incumbent U.$. President Barack Obama has been making plenty of mention of his role in the assassination of Al-Qaeda’s former leader Osama bin Laden in campaign speeches, hundreds of protestors in Kuwait chanted outside the U.$. embassy, “Obama, we are all Osama.” Osama’s vision of a Pan-Islamic resistance to U.$. occupations and economic interference in the Muslim world has reached new heights this week.

The Amerikan media has tried to play it off as a small group of trouble makers protesting, while Amerikans are shocked that they can be blamed for a fringe movie they have never seen and think is a piece of crap. At the same time, Amerikans seem very willing to condemn the protestors as ignorant, violent, low-lifes – just as the movie in question portrayed Muslims. But the trigger of these protests is far less important than the history of U.$. relations to the people involved. The most violent reactions occurred in countries that have all been under recent bombing attacks by the U.$. military, two of them for many years now, and the other had their whole government overthrown. Cocky Amerikans won’t recognize that the ambassador was targeted as the highest level representative of the U.$. puppet master in Libya.

MIM has held for some time that Muslim organizations have done more to fight imperialism in recent years in most of the world than communists have.(2) And while there are plenty of ways communists could theoretically be doing a better job, they are not. As materialists we must accept and work with the people and conditions we are given. And we do not hesitate to recognize that Islam has brought us the biggest internationalist demonstration of anti-imperialism we’ve seen in some time.

Nos aproximamos al quinto aniversario como organización al reunir nuestro Tercer Congreso. Aunque miembros de MIM(Prisiones) - y por supuesto aquellos de USW - han estado en el movimiento de prisiones por mucho mas tiempo, encontramos que esta es una oportunidad apropiada para reflexionar acerca de donde se encuentra el movimiento de prisiones y como se ha desarrollado.

Una serie de huelgas de hambre en California, durante el año 2011, tuvo un gran impacto a lo largo de la nación. Muchos activistas, desde aquellos encubiertos, hasta anarquistas y reformistas, se unieron alrededor de este movimiento y como resultado continuaron enfocándose en el trabajo de prisiones. Mientras nuestros predecesores en MIM habían visto la importancia del movimiento de prisiones desde décadas atrás, su visión ha sido afirmada mucho mas el día de hoy cuando comenzamos a alcanzar una masa crítica de actividad. Es ahora un tópico caliente en el nacionalismo blanco de izquierda, lo cual es significativo puesto que los blancos no son afectados por el sistema de prisiones de una manera tan extensa como para considerarlo un interés legítimo y prioritario.

Este desarrollo gradual ha sido el resultado de dos factores: Una conmoción por fuera de las prisiones debido a los hechos alrededor del sistema de injusticia de los Estados Unidos, y a prisioneros organizándose en el interior de las cárceles; factores en los cuales MIM y USW han estado trabajando diligentemente por décadas. En el año y medio que ha pasado, la organización de los prisioneros alcanzó un momento importante con la huelga de Georgia y las huelgas de hambre de California, las cuales fueron coordinadas a un nivel estatal. Estos eventos fueron particularmente significativos entre los prisioneros, pero al mismo tiempo capturaron la atención de los medios y de la comunidad internacional. Más aun, porque hay una serie de acciones similares que continúan desarrollándose a lo largo del país. (Recientemente en Virginia, Ohio, Texas, Illinois, la prisión federal súper máxima ADX, Limon en Colorado y una huelga de hambre adicional en Georgia.)

Entre tanto, el aspecto de conmoción llego a un punto importante con la publicación del libro “The New Jim Crow” (El nuevo Jim Crow), el año pasado. Este libro ha logrado conseguir bastante atención en sectores diferentes del espectro político. Aunque mucha de la promoción le presta atención indebida a las conclusiones tibias del libro, el hecho de que los datos se hayan organizado en un libro hablan por si mismos. Se requiere unas nociones preconcebidas muy arraigadas para leer este libro y atreverse a negar la opresión del sistema de injusticia americano contra las seudo colonias internas. Por lo tanto, pensamos que el efecto general del libro será progresivo y significativo a pesar de sus limitaciones.

Es por estas razones que vemos la necesidad de apoderarnos del momento. Cuando comenzamos hace cinco años tuvimos la gran fortuna de construir sobre el legado de los programas de soporte a los prisioneros, establecidos por MIM. La fundación ideológica de MIM nos permitió enfocar nuestras energías en asuntos mas prácticos, tal como el lanzar una publicación nueva para las prisiones, construir programas de ayuda a camaradas que son liberados, desarrollar cursos por correspondencia de estudios políticos, y lanzar un nuevo sitio de Internet que exhiba información amplia sobre censura, reglas de correo y abusos en las prisiones del país.

Con nuestra infraestructura ya terminada y trabajando correctamente, necesitamos ahora buscar maneras de tomar ventaja inmediata de la conciencia relativamente positiva de los prisioneros y de la atención relativa que la población americana le ha dado al sistema de prisiones. Siempre hemos mantenido que sin prisioneros organizados no hay movimiento de prisiones, es así que tenemos ese objetivo como nuestra prioridad inicial. Estamos tomando pasos para mejorar la estructura de United Struggle from Within (USW), la organización de masas de prisioneros que fue fundada por MIM ye es ahora liderada por MIM(Prisiones). Construyendo sobre las sugerencias de algunos líderes en USW, hemos habilitado un plan para formar asambleas en estados donde hay múltiples células activas de USW. Más adelante explicarémos una organización estructural para nuestro movimiento de manera que los camaradas puedan saber donde pertenecen y como se deben relacionar con otros.

Tal como vimos durante las huelgas en California, cuando la organización se expande, se incrementa la censura al igual que otras medidas represivas. A medida que aumentamos nuestros esfuerzos, debemos esperar que el estado incremente los suyos. Necesitarémos más ayuda que nunca de parte de los voluntarios en el exterior para efectuar trabajo legal y de agitación para mantener al estado leal a sus propias leyes y regulaciones.

Tan grandes como estos retos aparentan ser, sabemos que habrá retos mayores a nivel interno, así como obstáculos que deberémos librar en los próximos años. Las grandes movilizaciones recientes han comenzado a revelar lo que estos retos serán. Hay mucho trabajo por hacer en el identificar, analizar y resolverlas contradicciones dentro de la población de prisiones, que permiten que en las condiciones actuales, el estado dicte como debe una vasta población de personas oprimidas interactuar el uno con el otro, y como deben vivir sus vidas.

El movimiento de prisiones que se estableció previamente a la explosión carcelería de los 1980s fue un producto de las luchas por liberación nacional que ocurrieron en su momento. Hoy, la población de las prisiones es diez veces más grande mientras que el liderazgo político en el exterior es escaso. Las masas encarceladas deben cuidarse del número grande de líderes falsos que desde afuera, como oportunistas, toman a las prisiones como el tópico del día para promover sus agendas políticas, las cuales no le sirven para nada a la gente opresa del mundo. En esta ocasión, los prisioneros necesitan prepararse a jugar un papel importante, lo cual requiere una profunda mirada interior. Debemos no solo aprender del pasado pero construir programas independientes de educación que desarrollen las habilidades de las camaradas de hoy para conducir un análisis propio de las condiciones que enfrentan. Encima de esto debemos promover y desarrollar una visión internacionalista para encontrar respuestas y alianzas en las naciones oprimidas alrededor del mundo, así se pueden remover las vendas de los ojos que nos mantienen enfocados exclusivamente en América. No se puede encontrar liberación en el americanismo. El hecho que los americanos han creado un sistema de prisiones que empequeñece todos los demás en la historia humana, es un ejemplo del porque no hay liberación en el americanismo.

Es con un optimismo cauto que aprobamos la siguiente resolución en nuestro último congreso. Pensamos que este plan responde a las propuestas enviadas por algunos líderes de USW. Esperamos que todos ustedes trabajen con nosotros para hacer de el una estructura efectiva.

Resolución del congreso sobre la estructura de USW.

MIM(Prisiones) esta iniciando la creación de asambleas estatales dentro de USW, la organización antiimperialista de los prisioneros. Una asamblea será aprobada cuando existen dos o mas células dentro del estado, las cuales son reconocidas como activas y trabajando bajo el estándar de USW. MIM(Prisiones) servirá como ente de apoyo a estas asambleas con un foque orientado a la organización alrededor de las necesidades de la comunidad prisionera en ese estado. Puesto que el sistema de prisiones de los Estados Unidos esta organizado primordialmente por estado, las asambleas trabajarán de acuerdo a las necesidades especificas y condiciones encontradas en el estado en particular.

En el caso donde las células poseen otras identidades diferentes a USW no se les requerirá que usen ese nombre. Por ejemplo, La Organización Revolucionaria del Orden Negro (Black Order Revolutionary Organization), que se identifica a si misma como un ‘Nuevo movimiento africano revolucionario’ podrá ser invitada a participar en una asamblea estatal de USW. Aunque USW no favorece las luchas de una nación opresa sobre otras igualmente oprimidas, como movimiento reconocemos la utilidad e importancia de una organización especifica a la nación. En el ambiente de prisiones hay muchas líneas que no se pueden cruzar bajo las condiciones actuales, esto limita la afiliación en un grupo. Mientras estas células exhiban un internacionalismo y antiimperialismo auténtico, ellas pueden poseer afiliación doble en USW por medio de su unión a la asamblea estatal.

Con esta propuesta estamos expandiendo la estructura de nuestro movimiento. Reconocemos los dos pilares principales de el liderazgo ideológico del movimiento actual: el primero siendo la célula de MIM(Prisiones) y el segundo siendo el grupo de escritores de Under Lock & Key (Bajo Llave), el cual también está compuesto por miembros de USW y dirigido y apoyado por MIM(Prisones).

Las asambleas estatales deberán buscar en estos dos grupos la orientación ideológica necesaria para organizar su trabajo. Esto se encontrará principalmente en las páginas de Under Lock & Key. En contraste, la función principal de las asambleas será el trabajo práctico y directo que sirva a los intereses de la clase encarcelada. Las asambleas servirán para coordinar el trabajo de organización de las células dispersas para que trabajen de una manera más unificada.

MIM(Prisiones) establecerá inmediatamente la asamblea de California, a la que seguirán otras a medida que las condiciones lo permitan.

The young comrades and I did build and protest by fasting and study on September 9, 2012, in solidarity with the comrades of the Attica prison uprising in 1971, and we organized in unity and peace without any problems.

Many of the young comrades did a MIM(Prisons) study group assignment as well as readings from Under Lock & Key. We had a very positive 2 days of study and building. I was very pleased with the young comrades and to see them in love and unity with respect.

For the morning meal the mess hall was virtually empty. For the noon meal there were approximately 120 prisoners in attendance. Usually, when they serve baked chicken and rice there are some 360 prisoners in attendance. A lot more prisoners turned out for the evening meal. Overall there was a low attendance for meals.

Next year things will be different and better organized. I’m in the process of obtaining two articles dealing with the Attica rebellion. I’ll have copies of the articles run off and give one of each to the entire prison population. This can be accomplished within a year’s time.

Being that today is September 9th and a day of solidarity and peace, all sorts of nations (organizations) got together here in the rec yard and had a jailhouse BBQ and lived in peace just for the day here at Cross City, Florida.

I always enjoy the Under Lock and Key. Hopefully one day some of my articles will be published in them. Allow me to extend in your direction a revolutionary embrace and a warrior’s salute. I hope for Florida one day to move forward in our prison system. Little by little with the help of the folks at MIM(Prisons).

MIM(Prisons) adds:There seems to be much support for unity between organizations in Florida. See the previous report of lumpen organizations coming together in Everglades Correctional Institution.

Today is September 9th, 2012. My comrade (my celly) and I are participating in the mass stoppage of work and fast for our comrades who fell in Attica. Although we are in Ad-Seg we have chosen to sacrifice. No food, no petty stuff, no arguing out the door, only working out four times for 1 hour each time, reading, studying and talking politics. For me fasting is something I do once a month, but today is the first time I’ve worked out during my fast. My comrade is pushing me and I’m not stopping. From midnight to midnight is how we’re moving.

I’m writing this to not only inform you of this movement, but how things are going in these human warehouses here in Missouri. It’s still hard to find unity here. No one wants to miss a meal or two to make a stand, but they’ll continue to talk about how bad things are. It’s not strange.

I want to raise an issue concerning your paper. My comrade who is Black just had your July/August issue of ULK censored. The reason for this censorship was the article about the mass work stoppage on September 9th. I am Caucasian and fully dedicated to the struggle. I have received your July/August issue of ULK. This discrimination towards my comrade is not strange.

My comrade has filed his grievance on this censorship. This state doesn’t even want us to learn and that is just one thing wrong with this state. They would rather close down schools and build new prisons.

[The following article begins with excerpts from an article by a California prisoner, which gives a detailed historical account of relevant case law, and was originally published by San Francisco BayView. Also available on our website is the full court opinion for In Re Crawford.]

Greetings. The struggle is long and arduous, and sometimes we do etch out significant victories, as in the case of our brotha in In re Crawford, 206 Cal.App.4th 1259 (2012).

It’s important to emphasize that this victory is a significant step in reaffirming that prisoners are entitled to a measure of First Amendment protection that cannot be ignored simply because the state dislikes the spiel. New Afrikan prisoners have a right to identify with their birthright if they so choose, as does anyone else for that matter – Black, White or Brown. …

[California prison officials] have gone so far as to boldly proclaim that the term New Afrikan was created by the Black Guerilla Family (BGF) and that those who identify as or use the term are declaring their allegiance to the BGF, which has been declared a prison gang. They have sought to suppress its usage by validating (i.e. designating as a gang member or associate) anyone who uses the term or who dares mention the name George Jackson. …

Our brotha’s case In Re Crawford was filed June 4, 2012, and certified for publication June 13. In a brilliant piece of judicial reasoning, a panel of justices in a 3-0 decision finally reaffirmed a prisoner’s First Amendment right to free speech and expression, stating:

Freedom of speech is first among the rights which form the foundation of our free society. “The First Amendment embodies our choice as a nation that, when it comes to such speech, the guiding principle is freedom – the unfettered interchange of ideas – not whatever the State may view as fair.” (Arizona Free Enterprise Club v. Bennett (2011) 131 S.Ct. 2806). “The protection given speech and press was fashioned to assure unfettered interchange of ideas for the bringing about of political and social changes desired by the people … All ideas having even the slightest redeeming social importance – unorthodox ideas, controversial ideas, even ideas hateful to the prevailing climate of opinion – have the full protection of the guaranties, unless excludable because they encroach upon the limited area of more important interests.” (Roth v. United States (1957) 354 U.S. 476, 484.”

The programs embodied in the New Afrikan Collective Think Tank, New Afrikan Institute of Criminology 101, the George Jackson University and the New Afrikan ideology itself are inclusive programs emphasizing a solution-based approach to carnage in the poverty stricken slums from where many of us come. The CDCR Prison Intelligence Units (PIU) have sought to suppress these initiatives simply because they do not like the message. They have marched into court after court with one standard line: New Afrikan means BGF and these initiatives are promoting the BGF. In re Crawford continues,

As recently noted by Chief Justice Roberts, “[t]he First Amendment reflects ‘a profound national commitment to the principle that debate on public issues should be uninhibited, robust, and wide-open.’ [Citation.] That is because ‘speech concerning public affairs is more than self-expression; it is the essence of self-government.’ [Citation.] … Speech on public issues occupies the highest rung of the hierarchy of First Amendment values, and is entitled to special protection.” (Snyder v. Phelps (2011) 562 U.S. , [131 S.Ct. 1207, 1215].

In re Crawford is a very important ruling because the justices said these protections apply to prisoners as well. …

George Jackson cannot be removed from the fabric of the people’s struggles in this society any more than Malcolm X can or Medger Evers or Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. or Harriett Tubman or Sojourner Truth or Ida B. Wells, Rosa Parks or Frederick Douglass, or the countless others who’ve fought and struggled for a brighter future for generations to come.

What CDCR and its PIU are trying to do is make a run around the First Amendment by shielding its suppression activity under the guise of preventing gang activity, just as it’s done historically, which gave rise to Procunier v. Martinez (1974) 416 U.S. 396, 413.

In In re Crawford, CDCR argued for an exception to the Martinez test for validated gang members. The court declined to make such an exception, holding: “Gang related correspondence is not within the exception to the First Amendment test for censorship of outgoing inmate mail.”

The fact that they even argued for such an exception shows their mindset. Their intentions are to suppress that which they believe to be repugnant, offensive and that which they believe a prisoner ought not be thinking! In their minds we have no right to think or possess ideas, concepts or vision beyond that which they believe we should possess.

Until In Re Crawford, these highly educated judges were sanctioning this nonsense with twisted, perverted rulings permitting a newspaper article or magazine layout or book to be used against a prisoner for validation purposes [to put them in torture cells - editor]. They issued twisted rulings like those in Ellis v. Cambra or Hawkins v. Russell and In Re Furnace, where the petitioner was told he has no right to his thoughts and the First Amendment only protects a prisoner’s right to file a 602 [grievance form].

These kinds of fallacious rulings ought to be publicized so as to show the skillful manipulation of the law by those sworn to uphold it. In Re Crawford reestablishes that First Amendment protections apply to prisoners and that we too enjoy a measure of free speech and expression. We ought not be punished with fabricated notions of gang activity for merely a thought!

However, if we are to continue to meet with success, we need our professors, historians and intellectuals to step up and provide declarations that we can use in our litigation, defending our right to read, write and study all aspects of a people’s history, like Professor James T. Campbell did in In Re Crawford. This is the only way a prisoner can challenge the opinion of a prison official. …

Much work remains to be done, like stopping the bogus validations based on legitimate First Amendment material. We know that many individuals are falsely validated simply for reading George’s books or a newspaper article, for observing Black August or for simply trying to get in touch with one’s cultural identity.

These legitimate expressions should carry no penalty at all. You’re not doing anything wrong, and a lot of brothas who’ve been validated simply shouldn’t be. Nor should folks be frightened away from reading or studying any aspect of history simply because the state doesn’t like its content. Judges who issue fallacious opinions permitting prisoners to be punished for reading a George Jackson book or researching your history should be exposed.

Literary content and cultural and historical materials are not the activities of a gang; they are political and social activities that we have a right to express, according to the unanimous decision in In re Crawford.

The First Amendment campaign continues to forge ahead, although we still don’t have a lawyer. The campaign still exists, and we anticipate even greater successes in the future. … We’ve cracked one layer of a thick wall. Now all prisoners should take advantage of this brilliant ruling and reassert your rights to study your heritage, Black, White or Brown.

MIM(Prisons) adds: The issue in this case was one that we have experienced first-hand as well. For example, in 2008 a letter from a comrade in California was censored before it could reach us because it discussed the New Afrikan Collective, which allegedly was a code word for the Black Guerrilla Family.(1) But in reality, the New Afrikan Collective was a new political organization in New York focused on bettering the conditions of New Afrikans as a nation, with no connections to any sort of criminal activity.

The first thing that strikes us about this case is a quote from the proceedings cited by the author above, “Gang related correspondence is not within the exception to the First Amendment test for censorship of outgoing inmate mail.” Unfortunately this is not part of the final opinion explaining the decision of the court, and it is specific to outgoing mail from the prison. Nonetheless, it would logically follow from this statement that anything that can be connected to a gang is not automatically dangerous or illegal.

“Gang members” have long been the boogeyman of post-integration white Amerika. The pigs use “gang member” as a codeword to excuse the abuse and denial of constitutional rights to oppressed nation youth, particularly New Afrikan men. And this has been institutionalized in more recent years with “gang enhancements,” “gang injunctions” and “security threat group” labels that punish people for belonging to lumpen organizations. Often our mail is censored because it mentions the name of a lumpen organization in the context of a peace initiative or organizing for prisoners’ humyn rights. While criminal activity is deemed deserving more punishment with the gang label, non-criminal activity is deemed criminal as well.

As the author discusses, it becomes a question of controlling ideas to the extreme, where certain words are not permitted to be spoken or written and certain symbols and colors cannot be displayed. So the quote from the court above is just a baby step in the direction of applying the First Amendment rights of association and expression to oppressed nation youth. Those who are legally inclined should consider how this issue can be pushed further in future battles. Not only is such work important in restoring rights to people, but we can create space for these organizations to build in more positive directions.

Part of this criminalization of a specific sector of society is the use of self-created and perpetuated so-called experts on gang intelligence. Most of our readers are all too familiar with this farce of a profession that is acutely exposed by the court’s opinion in this case. The final court opinion calls out CO J. Silveira for claiming that the plaintiff’s letter contained an intricate code when he could provide no evidence that this was true. They also call him out for using his “training and experience” as the basis for all his arguments.

The warden’s argument is flawed for two reasons. First, the argument is based solely on the unsupported assertions and speculative conclusions in Silveira’s declaration. The declaration is incompetent as evidence because it contains no factual allegations supporting those assertions and conclusions. Second, even if the declaration could properly be considered, it does not establish that the letter posed a threat to prison security.

As great as this is, as the author of the article above points out, they usually get away with such baseless claims. More well thought out lawsuits like this are needed, because more favorable case law is needed. But neither alone represents any real victory in a system that exists to maintain the existing social hierarchy. These are just pieces of a long, patient struggle that has been ongoing for generations. The people must exercise the rights won here to make them real. We must popularize and contextualize the nature of this struggle.

We can’t afford for prisoners to sacrifice their lives because self-appointed vanguards refuse to do a little philosophic/scientific homework and make a few minor adjustments to our current path. We’re pursuing what is essentially a tactical issue of reforming the validation process as if it were a strategic resolution to abolishing social-extermination of indefinite isolation. This is not a complex issue to understand, and it requires a minimal amount of study at most to understand that the validation process is secondary and is a policy external to the existence of the isolation facilities. It’s not difficult to comprehend that external influences create the conditions for change but real qualitative change comes from within, and to render the validation process, program failure, the new step down program, etc, obsolete, and end indefinite isolation, requires an internal transformation of the isolation facilities (SHU and Ad-Seg) themselves. Otherwise, in practice, social extermination retains continuity under a new external label. Appearance is reformed, hence the suffix “re”, while the essential composition (contradictions) is unchanged. Do you fix a bad motor on a car by altering its appearance with a new paint job? It might look nice, but it’s still the same motor.

I don’t know if these “representatives” are just refusing to consider anything else, if they are making a conscious decision to hear the sound of their own voices only, or if they believe that to acknowledge a need for course adjustments will discredit them. They hold power in here, but it’s a power held through threat of force, and most youngsters aspire to this, or those who don’t, understandably keep their mouths zipped. Either way, because of this power, they’re not used to hearing the truth, but praise form the brown-nosers who tell them what they think they want to hear and tell them what will benefit them. This only hinders the accuracy of their analysis. This refusal to be more receptive and adjust course where necessary based on an application of dialectical materialism is going to cost us lives pursuing an incorrect course. Our victories are superficial and exist more in appearance than anything. They are privileges, rights that we already had coming to us, so what appears as a victory is really implementing our established rights (abstractly anyhow), without actually making essential progress. It’s a vehicle to distract us without actually conceding essential transformations. And these are, and will be, reversible.

Although it is dangerous, and all it takes is for the current so-called reps to openly denounce any true vanguard, all others will accept this proclamation, and the true vanguard will be discredited and hit first opportunity. So a true vanguard must tread very carefully to build large scale support with their ideas and education. But what’s of greatest importance, it must be done in the interest of all! As we, you and I, know, a vanguard is not someone, a program, philosophic logic, etc, that appoints itself, it is the most advanced line and it must be complemented with a corresponding practice. As Lenin and Joe Steel said, “there can be no theory there can be no movement” Just as a “movement is necessary to develop theory upon.” Obviously, I’m paraphrasing but the point is evident.

I’m convinced we need to circulate a few pamphlets that serve an educational purpose, but more importantly, function as an outline. And if necessary, appeal to convict mass to launch our own hunger strike, one or two at a time. Write up our own list of demands - tables in each pod, phones, bars, cellies, dayroom time for social intercourse, demands that can all be achieved by a victorious struggle for “association” based on U.S. constitutional rights and UN Geneva conventions (for publicity). To implement “association” (social intercourse) would necessitate the peripheral demands above and thus qualitatively change the isolation units from within as we currently know them.

MIM(Prisons) responds: Control Units are isolation cells within prisons where people are confined to small cells for long periods of time. Control units are a common tool of repression throughout the Amerikan prison system, frequently used to target prisoners who are actively fighting for their rights. They target Black, Latino and indigenous people who are a disproportionate part of control unit populations.

As a part of our ongoing campaign to shut down the control units, we fight for reforms to give our comrades in indefinite isolation some improved conditions, especially when these reforms are focused on better enabling their political study and organizing. We recognize that some reforms may mean the difference between physical or mental health or serious illness. But we agree with this author that we need to fight the attempts by proponents of the criminal injustice system to paint a happy face on long-term isolation and call that “reform.” It is only by ending long term isolation completely will we actually win this battle.